


Head in the Clouds

by pipisafoat



Category: Firefly
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-28
Updated: 2011-05-28
Packaged: 2017-10-19 20:44:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/205018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pipisafoat/pseuds/pipisafoat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knows why everyone else does what they do with her. Jayne spars with her, and in return, she spars with him. Simon doctors her and gets to pretend she's still his little sister from long ago. Zoe keeps her company when everyone else is busy and gets a moment of silence and peace. Kaylee is a mystery, though. Kaylee touches but gets nothing back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Head in the Clouds

Sometimes, she thinks back to her childhood, tries to remember what it felt like inside her mind then, tries to compare, analyze, catalog--

And Kaylee always reaches over and touches her. Just a simple thing, short contact. Brushes her hair out of her eyes, squeezes her hand, or even just strokes her back gently, walking past. Brings her back to the moment. _There is no past. There is no future. There is just now, and now, and now._

She knows why everyone else does what they do with her. Jayne spars with her, and in return, she spars with him. Simon doctors her and gets to pretend she's still his little sister from long ago. Zoe keeps her company when everyone else is busy and gets a moment of silence and peace. Kaylee is a mystery, though. Kaylee touches but gets nothing back.

So she watches. Sits in the hammock while Kaylee works on the engine, sits in the corner while Kaylee eats, sits in the hall while Kaylee sleeps. She doesn't think anything of it; she's observing, absorbing, learning.

Kaylee thinks something of it, though, and she finds herself one night sitting on an unfamiliar, stumbling through an apology on her way to an explanation. It takes more than an easy touch this time. It takes an arm around her shoulders for any words to work. It takes a hug, a real hug, before the words make any sense, but she doesn't find the truth. _It's in here_ , she says silently. _Pull it out of me. I don't want it anymore._

Kaylee is well versed in finding River's truths and not opposed to helping her make them real.

She reaches into her mind, into the place she calls The Repository, and digs through the knowledge she never learned. Guns, combat, command, all discarded until she settles on the one weapon she's looking for. She hesitates for a second before remembering the old adage: _Guns don't kill people. People kill people._ It doesn't matter where she got the knowledge, just how to use it - and she's sure, really sure for the first time in a long time, that this is really her, really what she wants, not something her former captors might have programmed into her.

When it's over, Kaylee reaches for her, pulls her up, kisses her again. "Just lie here for a minute," Kaylee says, and she kisses away the question mark that's almost tangible. She strokes her companion's hair, slides gentle touches down her arms, more firm than earlier caresses, soothing instead of arousing until Kaylee moves again, rolls into her and kisses her.

"Thanks." The whisper raises goosebumps against her neck.

"I wanted to," she says.

Kaylee smiles. "I wanted that, too. I'm talking about ... after." Another kiss, almost chaste. "Grounding me."

"And here I thought I was the one with my head in the clouds," River says through a grin that threatens to spill her heart onto the sheets between them.

"I'll get you there yet," Kaylee promises, sliding slowly down River's body, trailing kisses on the way.


End file.
